Carlyle, Gabriel

Opinion polls in Afghanistan and Pakistan in the last few months have reinforced the message that the people of the region want a negotiated solution to the conflicts currently raging. Such a solution is more attainable, given recent progress in the Afghan national reconciliation process. In Afghanistan, the International Republican Institute (IRI) carried out a poll in mid-May, published in June, that showed 68% of Afghans think “the government should hold talks and reconcile with the…

Hamid Karzai has selected Mohammad Qasim Fahim – “one of the most notorious warlords in [Afghanistan], with the blood of many Afghans on his hands from the civil war” (according to Human Rights Watch) – as one of his two vice-presidential candidates in the August elections.

Human Rights Watch identified Fahim as a key commander in the February 1993 Afshar massacre, when about 800 members of the Shia Hazara minority were killed in Kabul. An international official in Kabul has…

On 3 May, more than 100 Afghan civilians were killed during airstrikes on the villages of Gerani, Gangabad and Koujaha in Farah province, western Afghanistan.
The US/NATO have confirmed that they use white phosphorus in Afghanistan, but when accused of particular white phosphorus attacks, they suggest (without providing any evidence) that the Taliban may have fired the rounds.

Meanwhile, on 19 May, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees reported that 1.5m Pakistanis had been…

British commentators have been greatly impressed by Obama’s “new” strategy for the wars in Afghanistan/Pakistan (unveiled on 27 March, after PN2508 went to press), with the Independent’s leader writer claiming that it represented a “[complete] U-turn… shift[ing] the focus on to civilian projects and training”. “Fears in some quarters that the US planned an Iraq-style military ‘surge’, to be preceded by demands for many more combat troops from supposedly lily-livered European allies, were…

On 10 April 2009, Pakistan’s second-largest English-language newspaper (circulation 140,000), the News International, cited figures on US drone attacks “compiled by the Pakistani authorities”. According to these figures, of the 60 cross-border Predator drone strikes into Pakistan between 14 January 2006 and 8 April 2009, only 10 hit their actual targets, killing 14 wanted al-Qaeda leaders. These 60 strikes also killed a reported 687 Pakistani civilians.

Of the 14 drone attacks…

While newspapers and politicians fulminate against the terrorist threat to Britain that supposedly emanates from Pakistan, few British commentators have even noticed the large-scale state terrorism being practised in Pakistan by the US and Britain – and the Pakistani government (under pressure from Washington).

When referred to at all – usually in passing – Pakistani government actions in the border Federally Administered Tribal Area (FATA) are usually referred to, euphemistically…

Obama’s Guantanamo
On coming into office, US president Barack Obama promised to shut down the US prison camp for suspected terrorists on Guantanamo within a year and to fight terrorism “in a manner that is consistent with our values and our ideals”. As our last issue went to press, Obama quietly indicated that he will continue to deny the right to trial to hundreds of terror suspects held at Bagram air base in Afghanistan, a place human rights lawyers call “Obama’s Guantanamo”. Bagram…

US president Barack Obama came to power promising both to talk to his enemies and to “finish the job” in Afghanistan (a phrase he used while visiting Kabul in July 2008). We are now seeing how these contradictory pledges are shaping US policy: “talking to enemies” has been revealed to be little more than propaganda; “finishing off the enemy” – through military escalation – is the core policy. The escalation is not only in Afghanistan, but across the border into Pakistan, and not only in the…

Though some of us may not fully appreciate it, media and communication systems (and the policies and subsidies that helped create them) should be a central concern for all activists. For example, without docile and generally compliant media it is difficult to see how the British government could have taken part in the disastrous and illegal 2003 invasion of Iraq – or survived the aftermath of having done so – or how it could continue to drive us at full pelt towards the cliff-edge of…

In Peter Davis’s documentary Hearts and Minds, Walt Rostow – a man with ample blood on his hands – famously lost his cool when asked to explain how the US got involved in Vietnam, demanding that the clip be dropped from the film… while on film. Rostow’s fulminations are a high point of the movie, and his eventual answer (“The problem began in its present phase after the Sputnik…”) incredible in the literal sense of the word. It was a good question, and I’ve yet to give a talk on Afghanistan…

A recent poll in Afghanistan has found a majority condemning Western airstrikes in the country, and calling for a negotiated settlement with the Taliban.
Escalation

Meanwhile US president Barack Obama continues with his escalation of the Afghan conflict. On 17 February, it was reported that Obama had authorised the deployment of up to 17,000 extra US troops to Afghanistan. According to the BBC poll (see below for more details), this is a highly unpopular move.

73%…

The US’s top commander in Iraq, general Raymond Odierno, has appeared to claim that all US forces will be out of Iraq by the end of 2011 (as required by the agreement signed by the US and Iraqi governments at the end of last year): “By 2011 we’ll be zero.” (New York Times)
However, when the Washington Post asked Odierno what sort of US military presence he expected in Iraq in 2014, he foresaw a force of “probably around 30,000 or so, 35,000”, with many troops training Iraqi forces and…

While US soldiers continue to resist deportation from Canada, the mother of two British soldiers serving in Afghanistan has spoken out against the war.

Two more US war resisters (Cliff Cornell and Chris Taske) have been forced out of Canada and back to the US. Cornell surrendered himself to US border police on 4 February after being ordered to leave Canada.

Taske also returned to the US, but was not arrested at the border. A further three war res

On 12 February…

Over 700 people from around the UK have now signed up to support the Gaza Freedom March. Timed to coincide with the first anniversary of Israel’s brutal 22-day assault, this will involve hundreds of internationals marching nonviolently alongside the people of Gaza on 1 January 2010, breaching the illegal Israeli blockade (see PN 2513).

PN is organising a training for people intending to go on the march. Assuming sufficient demand, this will take place in London on the weekend of 31…

Late in 2007, someone forwarded me an excoriating critique of the Socialist Workers’ Party (SWP) - the largest of Britain’s Trotskyist groups, and the driving force behind the Stop the War Coalition. Noting that the party had “shrunk to a shadow of the size it was even a few years ago” and that “anyone who has raised the issue has been derided”, the piece – written by a long-term SWP member for the Party’s internal bulletin - concluded that “[u]nless we radically address the decline we’ve…